To meet the need for interactive simulations with complex vehicle models, a generation of visualization tools have been developed. However, most of these tools have limitations inherent in their data structure. In this regard, most visualization tools have adopted a polygonal soup, that is, an unstructured collection of polygons, as their standard data representation. However, a variety of existing applications, such as CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics), FEA (Finite Element Analysis), and assembly simulation, require more than a cloud of points or triangles.
Thus, a need exists for a method of reconstructing the topographical information (relationships between polygons) of a polygonal soup in order to overcome the known problems with visualization tools.